Daily news blog for Seattle's Wallingford neighborhood

Can Wallingford win KEXP’s challenge?

Posted by Kate Bergman on June 7th, 2010

On Saturday afternoon we had the radio tuned to KEXP, which has begun its summer pledge drive, when we were tickled to hear an exhortation from DJ El Toro for Wallingford to win the station’s Hood to Hood Challenge.

We asked DJ El Toro about his shout-out to Wallingford. “I admit, I have a Wallingford bias,” he told us. “I lived there from 1996 to 2002, very close to 45th, and loved that it was a low-key, pedestrian friendly neighborhood. If my partner wasn’t powerless off the Hill, I’d have stayed there.”

The Hood to Hood pits Seattle-area neighborhoods and towns against each other for a week to determine which can donate the most money to KEXP. Last year West Seattle won, and KEXP threw their celebration, a weekend of free live music events, just a couple of weeks ago. Ballard won twice in a row, and Capitol Hill took the first honors.

The DJs prod all areas to donate, but DJ El Toro pointed out, “since we’ve already had Hood to Hood events in Capitol Hill, Ballard, and West Seattle, it’d be a fun change to have one in a different hood.”

As of this writing, Wallingford (which is part of the UDist/Fremont/Wallingford/Green Lk/Eastlake/SLU sextet of hoods combined for this challenge) is running third behind Capitol Hill and Queen Anne/Magnolia. Can Wallingford step it up? The Hood to Hood ends June 11.